Tom caught the cat just short of the stairs. It required throwing himself headlong, his hand extended as if for the great baseball catch. What he caught was a tiny handful of spitting fury, that he held very firmly, while bringing it up to his chest, and standing up. He registered, distantly, that he'd just hit his knee hard, and that the wood beneath the carpet had far less give than he expected.
Holding Not Dinner, he limped back to the bedroom. Rafiel was still standing, holding the paper. "I have to go," he said, in a little, squeaky voice.
"But how . . ." Kyrie said.
Rafiel blushed. "I should have told you."
"What should you have told us?" Tom asked. "You saw someone take that picture?"
"Well . . . not quite that . . . But that Summer girl that Keith brought in? Right after you and Conan took off—" He turned to Kyrie. "This was when they were trying to rescue you, you know. Anyway, right after they took off, Keith's girlfriend was right there, at the back door, and I thought it was very weird. She said she'd got lost looking for the bathroom, but you know, it's not like it's all that hard to find, or like it's not properly marked, and right there . . ." He frowned. "I remember at the time thinking that something was wrong, and even more so when she disappeared right after. But then Dante Dire came in, and it just made me forget all that stuff."
"Yeah," Kyrie said. "I think he has that effect."
And Tom had to admit he did. "I'm sure," he said, feeling like his voice was constricted, "that it is all a matter of priorities. I mean, the dire wolf could kill us. What is the worst this woman could do? Make me move on?" He shrugged, attempting to look completely unaffected by this. "How bad would that be? I've moved so much, from town to town, and . . . all over." But he didn't want to move, and his heart was breaking over even the possibility of doing so. He didn't want to go anywhere. Let alone that he had Kyrie and a home, even if it was just a rented house, and apparently, now, a kitten.
He didn't want to leave the diner behind. It was the first time in his life that he felt invested in a place. He owned The George—half of it. It was his. He had shaped it already and would shape it more, make it something uniquely his, his own diner.
"I don't think it will come to that," Rafiel said. He stepped inside the door and flung the paper towards the bed. "At most, we'll say it's a good Photoshop job. I mean, Tom, who is going to believe in dragons? Seriously? If they'd caught me or Kyrie, it might be worse . . ." He shrugged. "Let's just take care that this doesn't happen again, okay?"